


night terrors

by bubonickitten



Series: not alone [1]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Angst, Canon-Typical Horror, Character Study, Dreams and Nightmares, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, but i started writing daisy and jon interacting and it got away from me, i did not originally intend this to be this long, i just have a lot of feelings abt them ok, ngl the last 3400 words of this is about jon and daisy's friendship, spoilers up to MAG 132
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:40:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24225976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bubonickitten/pseuds/bubonickitten
Summary: At first, Jon assumes his nightmares are just that: bad dreams.But it's only a matter of time before he is forced to acknowledge what it means to be the Archivist.
Relationships: Jonathan Sims & Alice "Daisy" Tonner
Series: not alone [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1754110
Comments: 30
Kudos: 169





	night terrors

**Author's Note:**

> CW: distressing nightmare/dream imagery - think MAG 120. also, some passive suicidal ideation and brief spider mentions here and there.
> 
> Spoilers up to MAG 132.
> 
> (The first few lines of Jon and Daisy's dialogue were taken verbatim from MAG 132.)

Jonathan Sims has had the same nightmare since he was eight years old, with only slight variations.

Sometimes he is the fly in children’s overalls being offered up as a meal. He can feel the anxious buzz of the delicate wings on his back, a foreign and sickening vibration humming its way across his exoskeleton. Four feet rub together nervously in front of him in an uncanny, insectoid pantomime of hand-wringing. The looming form of Mr. Spider is made all the more horrifying by his hundredfold vision and his inability to blink.

Sometimes he is the larger fly, offering up a victim as sacrifice. He can feel his face contorting, features molded into the horror-stricken face of Mr. Horse that still haunts him on sleepless nights. He is forced to watch his offering devoured, slow and excruciating. After, the monster turns its eyes on him.

Most often, though, he is the spider. Or, rather, he watches from the spider’s perspective, a prisoner trapped behind the creature’s many hungry, glinting eyes, as helpless as a fly caught in a web. The dream sequence unravels in slow motion and he is forced to witness the weeping faces of his intended prey for what feels like hours. Enormous block letters bear down on him, announcing the spider’s insatiable hunger, its demand for more, _more, **more**_.

Finally, blessedly, he is allowed to close his eyes, but the relief is always fleeting, for when he opens them seconds later, he sees the aftermath of a massacre: smears of reddish-brown blood coating the walls, the floor, the wilting flowers in their vase.

Then, he hears a knock on the door. He sees many – _too many_ – hairy black limbs reach out to open it. He catches a glimpse of a terrified, familiar, but still nameless face through the crack. He always awakens just as the victim opens his mouth and begins to scream.

Jon may have managed to wrench himself away from Mr. Spider, but the fear and the guilt still cling to him years later, like the wispy strands of a broken web. It’s only right that they follow him into his dreams.

* * *

Jon isn’t sleeping well lately.

Well, that isn’t new. But he’s sleeping even _worse_ than usual.

It shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, Jon tells himself. The new job is stressful.

The Archive is a monument to entropy. A tornado could have swept through and blown things into a more sensible order than the previous Head Archivist left them. The Archives contain nearly two centuries’ worth of case files, and they're scattered about with no discernible system of organization. Material isn’t sorted by format: cassette tapes are thrown haphazardly into the same boxes as loose leaf paper. It isn’t sorted chronologically: case material from the mid-1800s can be found mixed in with recent statements from the 2000s. As far as Jon can tell, it isn’t even sorted thematically; on a cursory perusal, the statements boxed together seem to vary wildly in content, comprehensiveness, and verifiability.

In fact, the conspiratorial part of Jon’s brain can’t shake the feeling that there’s an eerie sense of _curation_ to the disorganization. The more rational part of him knows that Gertrude Robinson was simply elderly, set in her ways, and secure in a position that she had held for decades. Elias isn’t one for hands-on management in the best of cases; there was little to no risk of him actually making his way into the Institute’s basement to observe the way Gertrude ran her Archives, let alone to actually discipline her for lax work ethic.

Either way, though, the result is the same. 

The first thing Jon had noticed when he walked into his new office a week previous was a stack of unmarked boxes against the back wall behind the desk. They were partially covering what at first glance appeared to be fingernail scratches on the floorboards, but he told himself that he didn’t have time to dwell on that and deliberately pushed it to the back of his mind. He could deal with it later – or, with any luck, not at all. 

The first box he opened contained a handful of unlabeled cassette tapes, a stack of blank index cards in a plastic sandwich bag, an empty manila folder, a nonfunctioning USB thumb drive, and a mess of loose papers with no coherent theme: some fragments of personal correspondence (unsigned and handwritten on yellowed paper in nearly illegible cursive), the scattered typewritten pages of a statement (pages 2 and 7 of 10 missing, presumed lost), and a hand-drawn map of what looked like a labyrinth. The second and third boxes contained more of the same: scattered documents and a yawning void of context. The fourth box was completely empty. The fifth contained only a single matchbook with a faded spider printed on its surface, rattling around the bottom of an otherwise vacant box. 

Unmarked boxes, improperly-preserved documents, no rhyme or reason, a layer of dust, and an ignition source. It wasn’t a good start – and, unfortunately, it seemed representative of what the job was going to look like, at least for the first few months. 

But beyond that, Elias had been _insistent_ that Jon begin creating audio recordings of statements as soon as possible. Jon had initially chosen to interpret “as soon as possible” to mean “as soon as everything is organized,” and after seeing how big of a task that was, he was careful not to promise a time frame. After the third email from Elias inquiring about Jon’s progress with digitizing the old statements, though, Jon was honest: every day, he found himself adjusting the project timeline as they found more and more statements misfiled or missing.

“I believe it would be best for you to begin recording the statements as you go along,” Elias said. It was obviously an order, but he masked it as a friendly suggestion. Jon _hates_ when he does that; it feels manipulative and condescending, like a parent (or grandparent, in Jon’s case) presenting the illusion of choice to a child and daring them to call it out for what it is.

Jon never was good at keeping his mouth shut, though.

“My first priority is to ensure that everything is cataloged and stored properly. Digitization will go more smoothly if everything is in order _before -_ ”

“You have three perfectly competent assistants,” Elias interrupts. Jon bites his tongue before he can make a snide remark about _competence_. “I’m certain they can handle a bit of filing without your close supervision.”

“But we -”

“I want you to begin making audio recordings, Jon,” Elias interrupted, finally adopting a tone that brooked no argument. “It all has to be done eventually, and it doesn’t matter what order you go in, so you may as well pick a place and start.”

“Some of the documents are incomplete.” Jon couldn’t quite manage to keep his annoyance out of his tone. “I found pages of the same statement scattered across _three_ different rooms -”

“Start with the statements that seem complete, then. If you find more related case material elsewhere later on, you can simply make supplemental recordings.”

And with that, Elias had walked away before Jon could protest further.

So, yes. He’s stressed. The Archives are an unmitigated disaster, Jon only has three assistants to help him put them back into some semblance of order, and Elias wants him to embark on a massive digitization project when they still haven’t even inventoried the contents of most of the unlabeled boxes piled around the place. It’s like standing in the immediate aftermath of an earthquake and being told to start construction on a new building before the damages are assessed or the rubble is cleared. Oh, and he isn’t given any blueprints for direction.

Sleep troubles are to be expected.

* * *

These nightmares are new.

It isn’t that all of Jon’s nightmares involve spiders. He does occasionally have standalone nightmares that are perfectly spider-free: finding himself back in uni and failing a class he’s never attended and doesn’t remember signing up for; being chased by something sinister and tripping over nothing, only to wake up just as its teeth puncture his throat; waking in an unfamiliar place surrounded by things _just_ to the left of human, hiding behind names he knows well and faces he does not recognize.

But this is the first _recurring_ dream he’s ever had where spiders do not feature prominently.

At first, all he can see is the fog, pressing in on all sides. If the dream lent itself more to cartoon logic, it’s the type of fog that could be molded like putty. He doesn’t make the conscious decision to move; the dream simply puppets him forward and he lets it take him. He doesn’t even notice the open grave until one foot is suspended over it, and when the dream loosens its grip on him, he throws his weight backward, swaying off-kilter and nearly stumbling into another pit that has appeared just behind him.

The fog recedes just enough for him to make out the dozens of empty graves now surrounding him.

Then it starts to move back in, tendrils reaching out to him like the myriad limbs of a living, breathing creature, coating his skin and filling his lungs, and all at once he is pummeled with the overwhelming revelation that he is _alone_. It’s not just that there isn’t anyone around for miles. It’s not even just that he will never again see another living person. No. It’s that he is, for all intents and purposes, an island. No one knows him. No one ever has, and no one ever will. And he has never known anyone else, either, only carefully constructed personas meant to mask the self – if there even is such a thing as the _self._

He will die here, and nothing will remain of him, and no one will notice that he disappeared. And that’s… that’s okay. It’s _right_. It’s exactly as it should be.

Someone is screaming. Actually, he realizes belatedly, someone has been screaming for a while now, but only now does it manage to reach him through the haze.

Once again, the dream forces him to move. It maneuvers him around the vacant graves, drawing him ever closer to the voice. When he is finally brought to a stop, he is wrenched forward and his gaze is forced downward to behold a shivering figure sprawled six feet beneath him in the earth and mud. She looks familiar, but it takes a few moments before he can place her.

_Naomi Herne._

She nearly weeps in relief when she sees him, another living, breathing person after so long lost in the mist. She reaches up to him, begs him to help her, but when he tries to kneel and extend a hand, he finds that he cannot move. He cannot speak. He cannot blink.

He can only _watch_ , and so he does.

The seconds stretch into minutes stretch into hours, and the whole time she pleads with him to say something, to say _anything_. He watches as her fingers dig deep furrows into the walls of her prison and eventually her pleas dissolve into hopeless whimpers.

He wakes up in a cold sweat, feeling as if he never slept at all.

Untangling himself from the sheets, he stumbles into the bathroom, turns on the faucet, and splashes cold water on his face. As he stands and stares at his reflection in the mirror, he notices how pronounced the dark circles under his eyes have become. Naomi Herne’s statement had been unsettling, certainly, but apparently it’s affected him more deeply than he had initially thought.

It’s not all that surprising, he supposes. There have been a lot of changes in his life recently. The content of the statements he reads is… upsetting. He’s stressed. It would be strange if he _didn’t_ have trouble sleeping.

It’s fine. It’s normal. He’s fine.

* * *

The next night, he dreams of Naomi Herne again.

And the night after that. And the night after that.

Every time, she begs him to say something, to take her hand. She needs to hear another human voice; she needs to feel a human touch; she needs an _anchor_ , anything to chase away the isolation.

At some point, though, she begins to curse him. He is her jailor, her tormenter. She would rather be completely alone, to be left to suffer in dignified privacy, than to have her loneliness amplified by that unwavering stare. Why is he doing this to her? Why won’t he just _say_ something?

As usual, he cannot make a sound, and he cannot look away.

* * *

Jonathan Sims and Melanie King rubbed each other the wrong way from the moment they met eyes, and she is no more pleased to see the Archivist in her dream that night.

They both watch as Sarah Baldwin pleads with an unseen, unforgiving assailant. They look on in revulsion as she staples her skin back together. The scene plays over and over and over again, and eventually Melanie wrenches her gaze away from Sarah and hones in on the Archivist. All of her fear transmutes into anger and she unleashes a torrent of accusations, railing against him for his arrogance, his callousness, his foolish conviction that he knows better than everyone else, that he understands anything at all.

He can’t open his mouth to argue with her, but even if he could, he’s not sure that he could counter her allegations.

Melanie is still shouting at him when he is pulled from the hospital and finds himself in the graveyard again. Naomi Herne is huddled in the corner of her grave tonight, knees hugged tight to her chest. She is utterly silent. He wishes he could look away, but the dream has his head locked in place and his eyes plastered open and he watches her for the rest of the night.

Jon wakes up all too aware of his skin and what lies beneath it.

* * *

The tables in the dissection lab are piled high with pulsating hearts, quivering lungs, and writhing bones.

Hand trembling, scalpel in hand, Dr. Lionel Elliott slices into an apple as if demonstrating how to dissect a human heart. The Archivist catches the glimmer of tooth enamel, the glint of a silver crown on one of the molars, and a shared wave of nausea crashes over both of them. The professor begs the Archivist to take the apple from him, but as always, the Archivist is immobilized. He can feel every ounce of the Elliott’s helpless fear as if it is his own.

The Archivist knows what Elliott is thinking. He wants to run. He wants to curse. He wants to beg. He wants to bury the scalpel in the Archivist’s unblinking eyes. Instead, his blood curdles and his limbs contort and his joints dislocate and he writhes like a live butterfly pinned to a board in front of an uncaring, ceaseless watcher.

The Archivist feels all of it along with him, and neither of them can scream.

It’s only a dream, of course, but Elliott feels so _alive_ that Jon wakes up with a sense of pity all the same.

* * *

The Archivist wants to tell Helen Richardson not to open the door, but his jaw is wired shut with invisible thread.

He has lost count of how many times he has been forced to watch as the Distortion’s maze devours her, the scene playing recursively in its mirrored hallways.

Of course he dreams of her. She disappeared right in front of him and he could do nothing to stop it. In quiet moments, the scar that the Distortion gave him still twinges, and brings with it the deep ache of guilt. It’s to be expected that it would bleed over into his dreams.

* * *

Letter by letter, Tessa Winters consumes the keyboard. An eerie, cold glow highlights every detail of her pained expression. Although the Archivist’s mouth will not open, he feels one of his molars crack under the crunch of plastic, and as Tessa moves on to the monitor, a shard of glass slices into the roof of his mouth. The blood pools on both of their tongues, trickles down their throats, and they both wish they could gag.

The Archivist's thoughts unravel into acute angles and sharp edges, shredding his consciousness to ribbons. He is a collection of garbled text and rogue characters, of noisy pixels and castoff artifacts, of corrupted extensions and crossed wires.

It’s cold, and it hurts.

IT%’s/ côLd &&;t <<hurts>>.

I̴t̸'̴s̴ ̵c̸o̸l̶d̵, ̵a̵n̶d̴ ̸i̴t̴ ̸h̶u̸r̵t̸s̶.̸

Ï̵̡̻ͅț̴͘'̴̰̙͒̌͠ͅs̶̻̿̎ ̴̞c̵̮̒̾ơ̴̞͕̕͝ļ̴̱̅d̶̥̣͎̈ ̵̨͕̀̿̊a̵̗̪̽̆n̶͕̩̞͆d̵̦̮̳͐̏͗ ̵̢̻̑ȉ̷̪t̸͓̉͒ ̶̮͉̹̇͠h̵̳̻̞͝u̴̢̬̣̒ř̴̠́t̵͍̟͛ṡ̷̨̤͓͒̾.̸̦̭̓

I̶̢͚͓̤̗̹̱̠̱͚̤̾t̶̛̳̏̑͐͗́̍̈̿̄͒͗́̔̈́̈́̈́̚̕͠'̵̡̧̦̖͚͓͙͙͕̜̻̣̙̲͓̑͂͋̾̊̄͌̀̑͒̚ͅͅṣ̶̛̻͚͓̫̜̀̂͌͌̈̈́̃̽̏̐̔̌ ̵̗̫̓̊̾̇͆c̷̨̑̀̈́̇̊̇̑͊́̂̊̇͘̚͘̚̚̚͝ǫ̵̈́̎̿͑̔̔̑͛̀͋̉̋̓̾l̷̙̯͙͍͇̟̭̳͉̹̳̖͎͇̲͖̝̖͈̺̍d̴̡̫̼̗̮̹̎̌̽̏̂̐̑̈̏̀̃͆͗͂̓̚͝ ̴̧̛͈̭̼̭̰͔̥͓̟̲́̒̊̍̉̌͆̇̆̑͗̑̿̉̅̑͒̽̈̿a̵̳̰̽̌͆͂̏͒̌̓̔̈͐̆̿̕͝n̸̨̢̧̧̲̺͙̗̪̻͎̥͉̥͔͇̠͙̫͒̌̅̃͒́̌̈́͐̀̈͘̚͘̕͝͝ͅḋ̵̢̡̧̜͇̜̤̠̺̜̦̲̳͓̼̩̣̼̭̱͐̿̿̍̿̀͌͊̃̿͊̕͠ ̶̭̩̥̲͈͚̟͇̱̹̼̩̪̙̱͒́͑̌͒͐̕͜ỉ̸̲͇̬͓̫̪̞̜̱̪̻̲̎̿́̃̽̕͘͠͝ţ̸̗͙͍͍̫̞͚̞͓̙̼̝͚͕̮̋͋̏̌͂͗̈ ̵̨̟̗͉̯̘̙̫̱̹̱̲̘̪͖̤̱̟̦̘̹̟̎̐̌͗̾̋̿̄͜͠h̴̢̡̨̢̛̫͓̠̤͉̠̩̮͙̞̪̏̇͊̈͂̿̅͋͌͘̚͠ư̵̰͙̯͖̈́̄̊͌͐̾͐̃̈̈͒̑͠ͅr̷̨̛̗͈̣̰̘̲̩̦̙̅̃̽͛͒̈͜͠ͅṯ̶̮͕̺͖̹̺̺̦͈̰̮͚͇̳̘̺̤̹̭͐͊̏̓̅̊̏͌́̒́̚̕͘͘͜͝͝͠͝s̶̺̻͔̹̙̟̭̜̏̆͗͂̔̄̔͋́͆̀̋̈́͌͂̚͝.̶̘͚͚͓͕̝͖̪͔̼̙̲̞͎͉̩̳͍̙̩̋̆̅͒̇̅͌̆͗̉̋͊͒͐̔̅̏̕͜͝͝ͅ

* * *

When Jon finally bolts upright into wakefulness, he _knows_.

These are not his nightmares.

They are shared dreamscapes.

No, not shared. _Invaded_.

Just recently he had noted how long it had been since last he was the spider in his nightmare, but maybe that was premature.

At least the others showed up at the Institute to give their statements on their own. Tessa Winters, though, was his fault. He wrote the forum post that drew her to him. She wouldn’t be in his dreams if he hadn’t cast that net. He spun a web and waited for the prey to wander in, all because he needed to _know_ and was willing to lure someone in under false pretenses just to get the answers he craved. It doesn’t matter that he didn’t intend this – the consequences are the same.

And Tessa Winters _knows_ it. She meets his gaze, equally unblinking, baleful and accusing. He is a _thing_ with too many eyes, gorging himself on her suffering, devoid of empathy or humanity. When she looks into his eyes, she sees a ravenous, pitiless voyeur, and even if the Archivist was allowed to speak, he would not dispute her claim. After all, the Beholding is _the feeling that something, somewhere, is letting you suffer, just so it can watch,_ and the Archivist is its pawn and its representative and its instrument. Tessa's eyes pin him in place just as effectively as the ever-present Eye in the sky.

He is becoming – _has become?_ – that which he fears, and he cannot look away.

It really isn’t all that different from the spider dreams after all, except this time there are witnesses to his sins.

* * *

The words on the paper are blurry and his head feels full of cobwebs. His eyes itch and sting in equal measure, making it ever more difficult to keep his heavy eyelids from drifting shut. He keeps nodding off, leaning forward and jerking upright as soon as the sensation of falling grips him.

“-n? Jon!”

“Wha-” Jon startles as Martin’s voice finally reaches him through the fog. “I – what?”

Martin has a concerned look on his face. _That seems to be his default state these days,_ Jon thinks distantly. 

“I kept saying your name but you were just… you weren’t answering.”

“Oh.”

Martin worries his bottom lip between his teeth. Jon can tell that he wants to say something, but he just _stands_ there waffling, and –

“What?” Jon snaps, and then he and Martin wince at the same time. “I’m… I’m sorry, Martin. I – I’m just tired.” He rubs his eyes furiously, trying to chase away the haze. “I’m sorry. Did you need something?” 

“I… Jon, when’s the last time you slept?”

Silence.

“Maybe you should have a lie down? I made up the cot in the storage room, and –”

“I’m fine,” Jon replies through gritted teeth.

“You’re falling asleep at your desk. Actually, um,” – a small, cautious grin crosses Martin’s face – “I don’t know what paperwork you used as a pillow, but you have ink on your face.”

Jon groans and scrubs at his face with both hands.

“You really do need to sleep, though,” Martin ventures again, gentle but firm.

“I… I don’t want to,” Jon says stiffly. As soon as the words leave his mouth, he curses himself for the honesty – Martin is going to want to _talk_ about that now, and –

“Why?”

Jon is silent, steadfastly refusing to look Martin in the eye.

“Fine,” Martin sighs, exasperated. “But you can’t go forever without sleep, I don’t care how stubborn you are.”

He’s right, Jon knows.

Jon did manage a full 70 hours awake before he started nodding off in spite of himself. For the past few days, he’s been allowing himself short naps, setting his phone alarm at hour intervals to wake him long before he can enter REM sleep.

It isn’t sustainable, but the alternative is haunting people’s nightmares, looking into their eyes and Beholding what they see when they look at him: Cold, calculating predator. Unblinking voyeur. Too many hungry, prying eyes, feeding on their terror, stripping them of their dignity, soaking in their trauma with cruel fascination –

“Jon.”

“Fine,” Jon grumbles. “Sixty minutes.”

* * *

Whenever he slips into the dreamscape, Daisy promises to hunt him down. Finish what she started. Bury him in a shallow grave and leave him to become yet another mystery.

The Archivist wonders if being killed in the dream would wake him up, spare the other dreamers from his scrutiny for just one night.

He wonders how Daisy would react if he was able to tell her that he resents the absence of her knife at his throat just as much as she does.

* * *

Six months.

For six months, he wanders, an uninvited, _hated_ guest in those familiar dreamscapes.

The Archivist wants nothing more than to throw himself into an empty grave, to turn the damp earth into a prison with six-foot-high walls, to break his legs in the fall so that even when his resolve crumbles and he tries to clamber out of the hole, he will be unable to do so. The other dreamers would be safe from him, then. There would be nothing for him to watch but unyielding soil and the chill, impenetrable fog above.

He Knows that the Eye is still there behind the veil of fog; he can feel its unceasing gaze, but at least in the lonely cemetery, he cannot _see_ it.

There is an open grave in front of him, its waiting maw calling him forward, promising to shackle him, to hobble him with blindness and paralysis. He stands at the edge, knees locked and eyes peeled, staring down into a plot that he desperately wishes belonged to _him_ , and him alone. The dream keeps him there for what seems like hours, taunting him, holding relief just out of reach.

Then, the dream turns him around and pulls him inexorably toward his true objective. Once again he is forced to watch as Naomi’s freezing, bloodied fingers scrabble uselessly on the walls of her prison. Her tears have left trails in the mud on her face, and when she looks up at him, she asks the same question she does every single time: _Why are you doing this to me?_

Eventually – after far too long standing statue-still, eyes locked on Naomi’s pained, desperate face – the Archivist is yanked onward toward the waiting carnage of the dissection lab, the mournful singing of the coffin, the undulating mass of ants.

When Jane Prentiss shambles toward him, he can feel the worms burrow into his skin all over again. He wants to scream, to scratch, to grab a corkscrew and start digging – _Dig,_ comes the intrusive thought, blinking in his mind like a marquee: _Dig. Dig. Dig._ – but his mouth and his hands are not his own, and his eyes – _so many eyes, so reminiscent of the spider –_ are fixed on Jane. Her otherworldly screams pierce the night as she burns, and the Archivist desperately wishes he could clamp his hands over his ears to block out her death knell.

Being brought before Georgie Barker is almost worse than confronting Jane Prentiss. If she could still feel fear, the Archivist is certain she would wear the same expression as the others. Instead, there is only a mix of pity and resignation. Over and over again, Jonathan Sims has walked into burning buildings for even the slightest chance of having a question answered. She wishes she was more surprised to see what he has become, but she is so intimately familiar with his pattern of self-destruction and stubborn curiosity, and she has long since recognized it for what it is: a fatal flaw, coaxing him toward tragedy like a moth to the flame.

The exterminator makes no distinction between the Archivist and the Flesh Hive, and Georgie Barker likely wouldn’t, either. As always, the Archivist cannot find it in himself to argue.

When at last he finally awakens, he is not surprised that she leaves with such finality, her parting words condemning him as a lost cause. He pushed on past the point of no return, just like she always feared he would, and she has no desire to watch him burn.

* * *

Jon may not have been allowed to toss himself into a lonely grave, but the coffin welcomes him with an eager appetite, and imprisons him in much the same way. He may be unable to move, but at least his body is his own, unlike in his dreams; he may not be able to escape, but at least he can speak.

“After the mission. I was planning to kill you,” Daisy tells him, matter-of-fact. He knows why the moment she starts talking about her dreams. “Realized you weren’t human. Needed to die, as soon as it was safe. Never mind Elias and his… _insurance._ ”

“And now?”

“Don’t know. I – I miss dreaming. You don’t sleep, down here.”

Jon finds the prospect of eternal wakefulness in this place downright horrifying – the endless boredom alone sounds like torture – but... no sleep means no nightmares. 

“Daisy, you should know, I – I’m… if I wasn’t human before, I’m, uh – I’m even less now.”

The distant rumbling of the shifting earth picks up in volume until he can feel it in his teeth.

“Yeah.” Daisy doesn’t sound surprised. “Well, at the moment, I don’t care.”

“And if we get out?”

“But we can’t get out.”

“No.”

The noise grows in volume, drowning out his voice.

_I really should have known better,_ he thinks to himself. Of course his rib wasn’t a strong enough anchor. He’s so alienated from his own body at this point, so far from human that he couldn’t even _die_ properly. How many times has he found himself thinking, _What’s another scar?_ In a way, he feels just as detached from his body when he’s awake as he does in his nightmares. The idea that a part of his body would call to him from outside the coffin… it’s just as ridiculous as his rushed, irresponsible deductions about the NotThem’s table.

“I’m s – I’m sorry,” Daisy stammers, snapping Jon out of his reverie. “I’m sorry, Jon.”

“So am I,” Jon replies. _For everything,_ he does not say.

The rumbling fades, and silence descends on them in a rush.

“You know,” Jon begins after a minute, choosing his words carefully, “I… I didn’t know, at first. That the nightmares were real _._ ”

Daisy says nothing, and Jon interprets it as permission to go on.

“I – I thought that they were just _my_ nightmares. That the first statements I took hit me harder than I’d expected. I was so _dismissive_ to the first few people who came in to give their statements in person, and I assumed that my – my guilt over how I treated them was manifesting as nightmares, since I refused to process it in real life. That I was just…” He lets out a bitter laugh. “That I was just _stressed_ about the new job.”

“When did you figure it out?” Daisy asks levelly.

“I… I think I suspected after a few months? But I just – I told myself that I was being ridiculous. I went through a bit of a – a paranoid phase, and I thought that I was just… overthinking things. I tend to do that, to just – obsess, and let my imagination run wild –”

Daisy snorts. “Yeah, I gathered that.”

“I – I've had a lot of practice with denial, I suppose,” Jon says, sheepish. “Or feigning denial, at least. Playing the skeptic was… safer. Admitting out loud that I believed in – in monsters felt like it would… draw unwanted attention. That it would somehow provoke the thing watching me to strike. I convinced myself that pretending to be ignorant would keep the monsters at bay.”

“That’s…”

“Stupid, I know.”

Daisy gives a dry chuckle.

“I had to give up the act after – after Prentiss attacked the Archives,” Jon continues. “Even after that, though, I still wanted to believe that the nightmares weren’t real. But then one day I woke up and – and I just _knew –_ ”

The dirt around them begins to press in again, forcing the air from his lungs. Jon feels Daisy’s fingers brush his wrist and he takes her hand. _Not alone. Not alone. Not alone._

Then the pressure lets up all at once and they are both left gasping in its wake. 

“Keep talking?” Daisy’s voice has that desperate, pleading edge to it again. It’s so at odds with the Hunter that Jon knows, more like prey than predator. “I – I need – I don’t want to be alone.”

“Not alone,” Jon murmurs, as much for himself as for Daisy. “The dream that made me realize – her name was Tessa Winters. I took her statement, and that night she was in my dreams. The way she _looked_ at me, I just… I _knew._ She was really there. Her eyes were so – so _accusing_ , like she knew that it was my fault that she was there. And – and it was. The other statement givers came to me on their own, but she likely would have never come to the Institute if it wasn’t for me.”

“Oh?”

“I – I posted on a message board, soliciting supernatural experiences related to technology.”

“You _can_ use a computer, then,” Daisy teases, a smirk in her voice.

Jon smiles too, and for the briefest moment he forgets where they are. “I just turned 30 this year, Daisy,” he says, rolling his eyes, and she snorts.

“Still, I can’t picture you making forum posts.”

“I had an ulterior motive,” he admits, his smile fading as the old guilt bubbles up. “I had found Gertrude’s laptop, and I needed help breaking into it, so I – I figured maybe I could lure in someone who knew computers, take their statement, find a way to casually ask them to have a look at the laptop for me. It worked, but then she appeared in my nightmares, and – if I hadn’t drawn her to me, she wouldn’t be there.”

Daisy makes a noncommittal sound. Jon shuts his eyes tight and takes a faltering breath.

“And then – after the Unknowing, I – I should have died. I _was_ dead, technically. My brain was still firing – _dreaming,_ ” he says with distaste, “but I had no pulse, no respiration, no… no other signs of life.” He feels the pressure of tears in his eyes and he fights to keep his voice steady. “You should have seen the way the doctors and nurses looked at me as they were explaining it. A – a medical mystery – a marvel, really – the sort of thing that most professionals would kill for a chance to study – but they couldn’t wait to get away from me, to hurry me out the door.” He pauses to take a deep breath, but between the crushing earth and his own grief, he can’t fill his lungs. His exhale comes out shallow and shaky. “And – and Georgie, and Basira, and Melanie, and –”

Daisy tightens her grip on his hand. It’s so surreal that Jon almost laughs. This is _Daisy._ Daisy, who seized him by the throat, who tried to kill him, who _enjoyed_ seeing him terrified and begging for his life, who took such pride in the scar she left him with – and now she’s _comforting_ him. He isn’t sure how to process that turnaround, so instead gives her hand a squeeze in return, clears his throat, and continues.

“So – so for six months, I was in a coma. If you can call it that. But the whole time, I was dreaming. For six months, I walked through the same nightmares, over and over and over again. There was no waking up to escape it, and – and it meant that the other dreamers couldn’t escape me, either. Up until then, if I was awake while they were asleep, they could get away from me, but – but I was in the dream every hour of every day, so I was there every time they slept. And the way they look at me – like I’m a monster – it just… they’re not _wrong_ , but I just wish – I wish I could tell them that I’m sorry, that I don’t want this either, that I don’t want to watch. The Eye doesn’t let me speak, though – or move, or – or _blink._ I am an observer, and an observer does not interfere.” He laughs then, a little hysterically. “It – honestly, it felt like longer than six months. I lived through the same scenes so many times that I started to feel so _numb_ to it all.”

“What about my part of the dream?” Daisy asks quietly. 

“I – ever since the Unknowing, whenever I get to your segment, there's nothing but the coffin. I always enter it, but it never brings me to you. Until now, I suppose,” he says with a humorless chuckle. “Oddly enough, I always found myself wishing you were there.”

“Really.”

“Yes, I – it’s hard to explain.” He hesitates for a moment before settling on honesty. “You always looked at me like I was prey, instead of predator. Or – or maybe like I was a predator, but a – a _weaker_ predator, something that could be killed. A monster that could be vanquished. I… I _wanted_ you to catch me. I suppose I thought that maybe – maybe if I died in the dream, it would end the cycle, and release the other dreamers from the Eye.”

“Might have killed you in real life, though,” Daisy points out. “If the dreaming was the only part of you that was alive.” 

“It may have,” Jon agrees.

Daisy lets that linger for a minute, heavy and revealing.

“I… I don’t think I _want_ to die,” Jon eventually continues, “but I can't stop thinking that maybe it would be… better, if I did? All that would happen is that the world would lose another monster, and – and that would be fine. It would be _right._ But I still…” He chokes on his words, something between a laugh and a sob. “God, when did not wanting to die start to feel _selfish_ of me?” 

The dirt around them shifts, sibilant and imposing. They hold their breath, as if speaking might provoke it. Daisy waits for the rustling to settle again before she speaks.

“Why did you come here, Jon?”

“To – to find you, to get you out –”

“Yeah, but _why?_ I nearly killed you. Would have tried again. Would have _liked_ it.” She huffs. “I know you didn’t come here out of any loyalty to me. So, why?”

“I…”

“To get yourself killed?”

“No, I – I really did want to get you out of here.”

“Why did you come for me, then? Out of guilt? To justify not dying?”

“I…” Jon sighs heavily. “Yes, I – I suppose. And - and Tim was dead. Sasha is dead, and Martin is... gone, and when we found out you were still alive, I just - I didn't want to lose anyone else. I couldn't just leave you here, not if there was a chance I could bring you back.”

Daisy is silent. Jon knows that she wants him to say more, and he takes a deep breath.

“The others don’t trust me – not that I blame them, I don’t trust me, either. Martin is… he has his own plans. Georgie wants nothing to do with me. Melanie hates me for not having the decency to die, blames me for everything that’s happened. Doesn’t even think I’m _me_ anymore, just – just some monster wearing a familiar skin, and – well,” he laughs uncomfortably, “I have a hard time arguing with her assessment.” He takes a shaky breath. “And – and Basira, she… she doesn’t put much stock in my humanity, either. Sometimes she sees me as an asset to be used, but…”

He trails off, feeling faintly guilty for his mixed feelings on Basira. She doesn’t go so far as to claim that the ends justify the means, but she does frequently remind him that they need to be pragmatic, like Gertrude. She encourages him to use his powers when it will help further their goals. The rest of the time, though… she looks at Jon like he’s a dangerous animal, unpredictable and poised to strike. He knows that she’s fully prepared to put him down if it starts looking like he’s too dangerous to be allowed to live, and the knowledge crushes him. But at the same time, he does feel relieved that there’s someone who he can trust to put an end to him if he loses himself.

Nonetheless, it’s frustrating to be hated and feared for what he can do – to hate and fear _himself_ so thoroughly – while still being expected to embrace those powers whenever it’s deemed useful. He’s more of an instrument than a person now, a tool to be used and then locked safely away once he’s fulfilled his purpose. He may be a vehicle for the Eye’s machinations, but perhaps he can balance it by giving their side an advantage in whatever way he can, principles be damned. Whether it's Elias, or the Beholding, or the Circus, or the Web - for a long time now, he has existed only as a means to an end. He's resigned to that, now. But there _are_ moments when he can choose _who_ uses him or _how_ he uses his powers, and he chases that illusion of control. 

And he _did_ give Basira explicit permission to use him. 

Sometimes he wishes he had Gertrude’s certainty, or Basira’s resolve, or any sort of confidence in his own convictions. Most of the time, though, he fears what he could become if he _was_ more decisive. He doesn’t trust himself to live without doubt.

He doesn’t know how to explain all of that to Daisy, though.

“I don’t – I don’t expect them to trust me,” he says instead. “Or like me. It seems dangerous to be near me at all, and I’m not exactly” – he breathes out a short, bitter laugh – “I’m not good enough company to risk it. It hurts, and it’s lonely, but I – I do understand. But I can at least make myself _useful_ –”

Without warning, the Buried constricts itself around them in a rush, strangling his words and stealing the air from his lungs. This time, it feels like hours pass before it finally relaxes its chokehold. The only conversation that passes between them for a long time is synchronized, frenzied gasping for what little chill, stagnant air the Buried deigns to permit them.

“We’re the same, you know,” Daisy says eventually, forcing the words out even as she struggles to catch her breath. “I'm afraid of what I am, or - or was, or could be again. I needed the Hunt - the thrill of the chase, the kill. But now I – I look back and I’m disgusted. I hurt people who didn’t deserve it. Even the actual monsters were… I wasn’t killing them because I cared about justice, or protecting others, not _really._ I was feeding on the fear of the prey. It made me feel _alive_ –”

An abrupt coughing fit interrupts her then, and several minutes pass before she’s able to continue speaking through the grit coating her tongue.

“All I’ve felt since I came down here is the fear and the pain and the - the _guilt._ I accept that – I should feel guilty, and I – I probably deserve to be here. But still, I… I want to see the sun again, to breathe fresh air, to –” Her breath hitches. “I – I want to see Basira again.”

Jon can just barely hear her sniffling, but knows better than to draw attention to it.

“But – but if I leave here, I – I know I’ll hear the blood again. I don’t know who I am without the Hunt, but I – I still don’t want to go back to it. I should stay here – but I also want to leave – and that feels selfish. But I suppose it really doesn’t matter, does it?” When she laughs, it almost sounds like a bark, hollow and brittle. “There’s no way out.”

“No way out,” Jon repeats. “But maybe… maybe the world is safer without me in it – without… without either of us, I suppose.”

“Yeah,” Daisy chokes out, her voice hovering between a laugh and a sob. “That’s – that’s pretty messed up, isn’t it?”

Jon lets out his own tearful chuckle. “Yes. Yes, it is.” He pauses. “You said that – that you don’t sleep down here, that you don’t dream?”

“Yeah.”

“That's probably for the best,” he sighs. “At least this way, the Eye can’t reach the dreamers anymore.”

“And at least we’re – we’re not alone?”

“No. Not alone.”

“I’m glad that you’re here, Jon,” Daisy blurts out in a rush. “I know that’s horrible of me, but – but it’s the truth.” She takes a shaky breath. “I don’t want to be alone. I’m… I’m glad I’m not alone.”

“I’m… I think I’m glad, too,” Jon admits.

He wasted so much time pushing people away, refusing to trust, rebuffing any offer of help. Georgie told him that he needed human connection to help him stay human, and she was right, but when he finally admitted that – by the time he finally resolved to trust the others, regardless of his doubts – it was too late. When he woke up in the hospital, there was no one left to offer their hand when he reached out for help. Even worse, he can’t exactly deny that it’s his own fault.

But now, trapped here in the cold and the damp and the cramped, suffocating dark, Daisy holds his hand. The firm pressure of her grip is comforting, despite the clamminess of their skin. He can’t remember the last time he was touched with anything less than malice. 

“I’ve been alone since I woke up,” he continues, “and – and afraid of what I’m becoming. It’s nice to have someone who – who understands what it’s like. I think this is the most companionship I’ve had in…" He lets out a short, sharp exhale. "Well, in a long while. It’s nice to be the one _seen_ for once – by something other than a monster.”

Daisy tightens her grip further, and Jon marvels at how such a simple gesture is so much louder than words.

A silence falls on them then – a bizarrely companionable one, so incongruous with their current predicament. They clutch each other in the dark, focusing on one another’s breathing to coax them through the irregular ebb and flow of the earth pressing down on them, peppering the gloom with quiet conversation whenever the Buried gives them an inch to breathe.

Daisy talks about her childhood dog, and _The Archers,_ and how people are always surprised to learn that she has a sweet tooth. She tells Jon about the first time she and Basira went camping: They had stretched out beneath the night sky and Basira taught Daisy the constellations, the origins of their names and the legends they represented. Affection welled up in her as she listened to Basira muse about how even though the constellations vary across time and culture, humans have always shared this collective impulse to look up at the sky and make meaning out of randomness.

For the first time in a long time, Daisy had been truly present in the moment; for once, she wasn’t gnashing her teeth, impatiently anticipating the next hunt. Basira’s voice anchored her in the present, and the call of the blood was drowned out by a flood of warmth and devotion. 

Jon talks about the Admiral, and his brief foray into AmDram at uni, and how he's always hated poetry, but then he read some of Martin's, and, well... some of them were quite good, actually. Jon confesses that he too has an unexpected sweet tooth. Martin somehow guessed; whenever Jon was having a particularly rough day, Martin would make his tea sweeter than usual. Martin never drew attention to it, and Jon never commented on it, but it was... touching, if he's honest with himself. He wishes that he had told Martin then that he noticed, that he appreciated the gesture - that it made him feel seen in a _good_ way for once.

Jon misses Martin desperately, worries for him fiercely. Worse, he knows with a certainty that Martin will never know just how much he is missed. He spent far too long underestimating Martin, taking him for granted. Sure, Martin had stumbled a lot in the early days, but when Jon learned that Martin had lied on his CV, he was actually _impressed._ It's remarkable how competent Martin managed to be with no prior experience or qualifications to speak of. Daisy listens as Jon rambles on about how Martin is so much braver and cleverer than Jon or anyone else ever gave him credit for, and how much he wishes he could tell him that now. 

They go back and forth like that, confiding in each other about their regrets, and the apologies they will never get to make, and all the things they miss. They talk about fears, and monsters, and what it means to be human. They talk about choices.

Jon does not dream. Daisy does not hear the blood. Together, they listen to the quiet.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments greatly appreciated!!
> 
> I'm also on Tumblr at [bubonickitten](https://bubonickitten.tumblr.com/)!
> 
> ETA: just added this to a series bc half of it is jon & daisy friendship anyway :0 and bc i had that other fic designated as part of a series and it's been sitting as a series of one (1) fic for a couple weeks bc i've gotten distracted writing my multichapter fic, lol. i will eventually write more jon & daisy standalones though (tbh i have one half-finished WIP that i'll HOPEFULLY get to soon).


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